Monday, May 17, 2010

Generic Sheets and Printing dates

I keep seeing new generic sheets offered on e-bay at outrageous prices. People get them printed, then list them on e-bay as "rare" or "error". I normally don't look twice at them. Except, today I decided to look at the printing dates of the sheets. I noticed that several of them had been reprinted, and the reprints were not sold as generic sheets (as far as I know). For example, the Blue and White stamp (the beach scene) has had at least 10 different printing dates. Of these 10, I only have 7 in my collection at this point. The first printing was on 5/15/2007, and there was a second printing on 11/14/2007. I have both of these with the generic smiling face stamp on them. Then, there were two printings in 2008, 6/17/2008, and 11/6/2008. Both of these are offered on e-bay only with custom printed designs. In 2009, there were 5 different printings. The first was 2/4/2009 for the Passover comic book, then came the 2 sheets for the Pope's visit (3/24/2009 and 5/15/2009). The Casi Angeles sheet had an 8/5/2009 printing date. The last one in 2009 was the 12/2/2009 printing that again I only see offered on e-bay with custom printed designs. So far in 2010, there was 1 additional printing date (1/6/2010) that was used both for the Passover 2010 and the Herzl sheet.

The fun was not restricted to only the Blue and White stamp. The greetings stamps from 2003 also saw some reprints. It looks like the original set with the generic picture had two printing dates (7/17/2003 and 1/12/2004). There is also a bunch of good Luck stamps sheets with custom designs with a 12/1/2008 printing date, as well as a Thank You design with a 4/12/2007 date. The Good Luck design was also used for the soccer issue, with a 6/17/2008 date. The Hugs and Kisses stamp was reprinted for the Jetix issue on 2/10/2008.

The red and white flower design each had multiple printings. The original printing run was dated 1/30/2008, but the white flower sheet was reprinted on 10/7/2008 for the comedians issue, while both the red and white flowers appear to have been reprinted for custom designs with a 1/21/2009 printing date.

The Heart stamp has also seen multiple printings already. The initial printing was on 5/4/2009. That was followed with a 6/5/2009 printing for the Disney issue, and a 10/27/2009 printing for the Hanukkah issue. There was a 4/7/2010 printing for the second Disney issue as well.

I am missing several of these issues. Does anyone have some available for sale at reasonable prices? I am not interested in paying the hundreds of dollars a sheet some of the dealers want for their "scarce", "rare" and "error" creations.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

hi adam

please note that the postal service does not sell most of the sheets you mentioned as blank sheets, but rather only as " my stamp sheets" this is why you can not find them. every time the postal service runs out of one of these sheets they re-print.
the postal service now has 3 spots where one can design and purchase these sheets, jaffa ( the main office ) eilat and haifa.
customers that want to purchase these sheets can buy as few as 2 sheets but they need to submit the art work for the side tab. you can see how to order them on the i.p.a web site
for the future i suggest that when you see a new date on e-bay, you order 2 sheets with your own design ( maybe you could use your daughter's photo) and this way you could buy it at a much lower cost

Mark Goldsmith said...

Dear Adam,

Do all six of the "greetings" stamps exist in the personalized stamp format with a 12.1.2004 (European date format) printing date. I have only seen the Hugs & Kisses stamp and the Thank you stamps with that print date.

The Mazel Tov Wedding stamp never seems to have been reprinted.

The two original print dates for the Good Luck stamp are 17.7.2003 and 21.10.2003 with the Telabul Logo as the personalized design. The later print dates for this stamp are 5.12.2006 (seen only on Ebay as a variety of the Betar Type 1 soccer sheet with this date in addition to 17.6.2008 regularly found on both Types I and II). The picture of this stamp on the Israel Post website also shows this date, but current orders from the Israel Post website come with the 1.12.2008 date. I also saw a 2.12.2006 date once on Ebay (at an very high price of course). I have not seen this stamp with the 2004 date. Have you?

The Hugs & Kisses stamp has the same two initial printing date in 2003 dates in addition to the 2004 date as well as the 10.2.2007 date on the Jetix sheet and 12.4.2007 currently available if you order it on the Israel Post website.

I have not seen the Mazal Tov (gift box) with the 2004 date. Just the original 17.7.2003 date, a 3.21.2006 date issued when Israel won an Olympic medal in sailing, and 7.10.2008 date currently available from the Israel Post website. Have you seen this one with the 2004 date?

The Thank you stamp has the 17.7.2003 and 12.1.2004 original dates. I have not seen the 4.12.2007 date which you have seen. I will have to order that sheet from the Israel Post website and see if I get it.

I have only seen the With Love stamp with the 17.7.2003 date and the 5.12.2006 date. Have you seen this with the 2004 date?

Mark Goldsmith said...

A new pink cyclomen sheet has appeared on the Israel Post website www.postil.com

It is called "A Year of Fun - My First Hebrew Calendar" The printing date is 26.7.2010.

The price on the website is NIS 38.00 and registered mail to the US is NIS 10.90. The total NIS 48.90 is about $13.25 at the current exchange rate.

Adam said...

Mark- Thanks for the update. I have been remiss in updating my list of these recently. I haven't gone back tothe greetings stamps at all. I do know that I only have 2 dates, the 17.7.2003 date and the 12.1.2004 date. The 12.1.2004 date I have on only 2 of the stamps, but I will need to check which 2. Do you have any of the later dates to trade?

Mark Goldsmith said...

Sorry, I have no duplicates. I recently obtained some of the later dates by ordering them from the Israel Post website.